Equitable Resources​ and Access

Equitable distribution of financial and other critical resources—including access to high-quality educators, college-preparatory curriculum, and support services—creates the foundation necessary for every child to succeed.

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Preparing all students to meet 21st century expectations requires an accompanying commitment to allocate sufficient money, people, and time to the challenge. Systems must ensure that funds are equitably distributed based on student and school need. Local and state-level officials, working with their communities, must also become responsible for the wise and efficient use of limited financial resources.

A commitment to equity must encompass the range of opportunities and resources critical to student success, including:

Ensuring all students are taught by educators who are fully prepared and supported throughout their career.

Providing students with access to a range of supportive services that ensure their health and well-being.

Funding schools in a way that is equitable, stable, and adequate to provide all students with a 21st century education.

Providing all students access to a high-quality college- and career-ready curriculum and up-to-date instructional materials and tools, including computers and related technology.

“Almost 1.5 million children are educated in the 47 most fiscally disadvantaged school districts across 16 states.”

Suspensions from school can disrupt student learning and inhibit students’ success. The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) provides opportunities for states to address suspension rates and other non-academic indicators that affect student success. This brief describes how states can use data on suspensions, what some states are doing, and policies to reduce suspension rates. It is part of the report Making ESSA’s Equity Promise Real: State Strategies to Close the Opportunity Gap.

Under the federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), in addition to the required indicators of schools performance, states can select indicators to measure schools’ efforts to support students and provide equitable opportunities or to identify places where additional investments need to be made to improve education and support underserved students. This report documents how states are taking advantage of this opportunity to address disparities, make schools more inclusive, and help all students succeed.

The use of multiple measures in statewide school accountability and improvement systems under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) offers states, districts, and schools the chance to gather and respond to information that is meaningfully connected to student opportunity and success. As policymakers, educators, parents, community-based organizations, and other education stakeholders implement ESSA, they can use the information in this interactive tool to identify and target their efforts to ensure that students furthest from opportunity can graduate from high school fully prepared for college, career, and civic engagement.

This resource, from the Partnership for the Future of Learning, provides a comprehensive policy guide for implementing and sustaining community schools. It includes detailed information on the four key pillars of comprehensive community schools and features communications and policy development resources, including model legislative language and policy examples from across the United States.

Fifty years after the Kerner Report, our nation still struggles with persistent disparities in child welfare, educational opportunities, and economic outcomes—but there is still hope for change. In this Education and the Path to Equity blog, Christopher Edley, President of the Opportunity Institute, and Linda Darling-Hammond discuss the potential of community schools to overcome the entrenched inequities of today’s education system.

The Learning Policy Institute and our partners at the Coalition for Community Schools, Communities In Schools, and the Center for American Progress hosted a conversation with leaders on community schools. Panelists discussed how to implement a community schools strategy at scale and how local and state education policy can support this crucial work.

Education has the potential to be the "great equalizer" in society — mitigating the impacts of poverty and race. But that potential has yet to be realized in America. In this Education and the Path to Equity blog, Zakiyah Ansari, Advocacy Director with the New York State Alliance for Quality Education, discussed the progress made in investing in the right of every student to learn well.

Fifty years ago, in his book, Rich Schools, Poor Schools: The Promise of Equal Educational Opportunity, Arthur Wise noted the glaring inequities in public school funding and suggested that examination by the courts would reveal they were unconstitutional. In his blog, Wise describes advocates’ efforts to redress those wrongs through a judicial strategy, legislatures’ responses to court rulings and judicial orders, where we stand now, and what remains to be done to achieve equal educational opportunity.

This brief is based on a report reviewing research on the role of money in determining school quality. The research found that schooling resources that cost money are positively associated with student outcomes. In addition to summarizing the report, the brief offers these policy recommendations: Ensure school finance reforms are linked to thoughtful standards and supports for students and teachers, invest more in students who have greater needs, and invest in human resources.

Richmond, VA’s diversity is a point of strength, but the vast majority of its schools are still segregated by race and income. In the latest Education and the Path to Equity blog, Anne Holton writes about that reality and what one school is doing to change it. Holton is Visiting Professor of Public Policy and Education at George Mason University and former Virginia Secretary of Education.

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Featured Resources

In keeping with the Learning Policy Institute’s commitment to communicating high-quality research to inform education policy and practice, we have assembled a selection of reports by other organizations that address critical questions and issues in LPI’s core topic areas. This collection, which will be periodically updated, is part of our larger effort to provide policymakers, practitioners, and stakeholders with useful information as they seek to advance equitable and empowering learning for all students.

For decades, some politicians and pundits have argued that “money does not make a difference” for school outcomes. While it is certainly possible to spend money poorly, this viewpoint is strongly contradicted by a large body of evidence from rigorous empirical research. This document presents a brief explanation of the goal of school finance reforms, followed by summaries of the main bodies of evidence that illustrate how equitable and adequate school funding improves student outcomes.

This study of California’s recent major school finance reform, the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), is among the first to provide evidence of LCFF’s impacts on student outcomes. We found that LCFF-induced increases in school spending led to significant increases in high school graduation rates and academic achievement, particularly among children from low-income families. The evidence suggests that money targeted to students’ needs can make a significant difference in student outcomes and can narrow achievement gaps.

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